A Kenyan court sentenced two Iranian men to life in prison on Monday for planning to carry out bombings in Nairobi and other cities last year.

Ahmad Mohammed and Sayed Mousavi were found guilty last week of planning the attacks and also possessing 15 kg (33 pounds) of explosives. They were arrested in Nairobi in June.

Kenyan investigators said at the time of their arrest that it was unclear whether the pair had ties to al Qaeda-linked militants in Somalia or were part of another network.

Their lawyers said the two, who had both pleaded not guilty, would appeal their sentence.

Dozens of people were killed last year in a spate of bombings and attacks in the capital, the port city of Mombasa and the frontier region with Somalia.

The Nairobi government mostly blamed those incidents on the Somali al Shabaab rebels, who Kenyan troops have been battling inside Somalia as part of a peacekeeping force. - Reuters